There are more things in heaven and earth

November 06, 2012

We must give up on voting in order to turn to direct action. May the ghosts of Emma Goldman and Henry David Thoreau be with us.

“I cast my vote, perchance, as I think right; but I am not vitally
concerned that that right should prevail. I am willing to leave it to
the majority. Its obligation, therefore, never exceeds that of
expediency. Even voting for the right is doing nothing for it. It is
only expressing to men feebly your desire that it should prevail. A wise
man will not leave the right to the mercy of chance, nor wish it to
prevail through the power of the majority. There is but little virtue in
the action of masses of men.” — Thoreau, Civil Disobedience

December 23, 2011

The Christmas Truce of 1914 has been called by Arthur Conan Doyle “one human episode amid all the atrocities.” It is certainly one of the most remarkable incidents of World War I and perhaps of all military history. Inspiring both popular songs and theater, it has endured as an almost archetypal image of peace.

The above is from the addendum to an article written for schoolchildren on the truce at Christmas during the first year of World War I.

I knew about the Christmas Truce but had subsequently heard it was enormously exaggerated if not apocryphal. Apparently, that's not so. According to the above link, a few historians have verified that it really did happen and was quite widespread along the front line. Which made me think: Wow -- for a day, or a few days -- they held a war and no one came.

What's more, this is not as unprecedented as people think. Also from the addendum to the article:

Another false idea about the truce was held even by most soldiers who were there: that it was unique in history. Though the Christmas Truce is the greatest example of its kind, informal truces had been a longstanding military tradition. During the American Civil War, for instance, Rebels and Yankees traded tobacco, coffee, and newspapers, fished peacefully on opposite sides of a stream, and even gathered blackberries together. Some degree of fellow feeling had always been common among soldiers sent to battle.

In more recent times, he points out, cultural and language barriers have prevented informal truces from occurring in many battle arenas. Nonetheless, their historical occurence, along with estimates that (for instance) soldiers only fired 1 in every 7 times they were ordered to fire during WWII, does suggest that sometimes the common people quietly rebel against war. The elites, the CEOs, the war mongers, the intelligence mavens-- these are the men who want war, and bring us to war. The Zbigniew Brzezinskis and Henry Kissingers of the world. And when they garner the populations' support for war, it is always through false pretenses. Lies, propaganda, and false flags (such as the non-existent Gulf of Tonkin attack, or the apocryphal Spanish attack on the USS Maine) are used to whip up fear and anger in a domestic population to allow for war.

There's an anti-war book called War Is a Force That Gives Us Meaning, that argues that warfare can be exhilirating and addictive to some of its participants, but also to whole societies involved in a war. I shouldn't comment on a book I haven't read, but I would imagine that this process doesn't work quite so well without state propaganda. When I watched the old series Upstairs, Downstairs they showed that many British were gung-ho for war against the Germans, at the start of WWI. But that was on the basis of outrageous propaganda about the evil Huns. Remember those Iraqi soldiers who knocked over the incubators of premature babies in a Kuwaiti hospital? It never happened, but it's very much like the WWI anti-German propaganda. Take all that away, and would the common people feel so inspired by war? I doubt it. It's just that war, because it involves death, enemies, and "the Other," provides for the most potent propaganda there is.

We are constantly being told how terrible human beings are, but the worst atrocities are committed not because people run amok, outside the control of any State, but rather, on the orders of the State.

October 02, 2011

Here is an excellent 5-minute report on RT (Russia Today, a global news network) about the Occupy Wall St protests now going on in multiple US cities:

Not only is this extremely thoughtful reporting, in sharp contrast to what you see in the US media, but their guest is James Corbett (woot!), an alternative blogger / reporter. (I've followed him for some time, he's a really good guy and does some great work, check out his site.) RT frequently has such alternative researchers on its network. One of the reasons it does that, admittedly, is to poke a finger in the eye of the US establishment, which fears these independent muckrakers.

American and British media, which have global reach, have been waging information warfare for decades, more or less unopposed by any other major government. (al-Jazeera, which seemed to have so much promise early on, seems now to be afraid of United States disapproval, possibly because we openly targeted their offices and reporters during the second Iraq War.) Now there is RT to oppose Anglo-American media domination, and there's no question RT has its own agenda. But because the US is an empire without any clothes, all they really have to do to oppose us is to speak the truth.

September 08, 2011

A quick glance tells you Ron Paul eeked out the win, just beating Mitt Romney. Closer examination, however, shows you that in fact Ron Paul received twice as many votes as Romney.

Okay, I thought, their chart graphic is wildly off the mark, so maybe that was just a mistake and they've since corrected it. So I went back to the MSNBC poll page myself, and captured this image (as of 3pm Thursday):

Okay, now Paul is seen as being way in the lead, ahead of Romney. Only... wait a minute, now Paul has 53.5% to Romney's 16%, which is more than three times as many votes. And that top green bar sure ain't three times longer than Romney's bar. So it's still effed.

I'm reminded of this hilarious Daily Show bit (well worth clicking) on how Ron Paul is ignored in the major media. They are really obvious about it. Apparently the people who watch TV news are mostly asleep at the wheel and simply don't notice much, because there's a gross unfairness here which even a child could spot. It ought to piss people off, and it ought to pique their interest as to why the Establishment just hates this guy.

No, he won't win... and thank goodness, because they'd kill him as fast as you can say "military industrial complex" or "corporate fascism".

September 07, 2011

One of the first articles I ever read about gold had to do with the gold which apparently disappeared in the wreckage of the World Trade Center. It seems, based on newspaper articles, that there had been $950 million worth of gold and silver under WTC 4 on 9/11. It was located a few floors below street level, protected within bomb-proof vaults. While severely damaged, WTC 4 did not completely collapse, and the metal should have been fully recoverable, even if it had melted. Gold and silver are fairly inert and wouldn't have reacted with other materials.

Giuliani, however, was quoted saying that around $230 million worth of precious metals had been recovered. The question was, what happened to the other gold and silver? Doesn't that leave hundreds of millions of dollars' worth of precious metals missing? Had there been a heist of massive proportions, under cover of the attacks on that day?

One answer, the one that seems most likely to me, is not as thrilling. These vaults were apparently Comex vaults (Comex = commodities exchange). In the metals investment world, it's widely known that the Comex does not have all the gold and silver they claim to have. They allow people to think they're buying gold or silver, when in fact the physical metal they believe they're buying does not actually exist in Comex vaults. See, usually people will buy and sell this supposed gold and/or silver without ever taking real possession of the stuff, because that's a major hassle-- you need Brinks trucks and insurance and you pay fees, and they don't make it convenient by any means. Basically, all these people think they own metal, but they're just taking Comex's word for it. "Oh sure," Comex says, "we've got your 100 ounces of gold here, right in our vaults... it's got your name on it, scout's honor." But the GATA organization and some recent testimony provide evidence that Comex doesn't have that metal. Because (in recent years) only about 1% of purchasers actually demand to take physical possession for themselves, the Comex has never been definitively caught in its lies. It's like a bank that only has $1 for every $100 customers believe they have on deposit. (And don't think that isn't happening too!)

This 9/11 story of the missing metals suggests that even back in 2001 -- when gold and silver were dirt cheap and nobody wanted them, when demand was almost non-existent and you could hardly give the stuff away -- even back then it would appear that the Comex had claimed to possess more physical gold and silver than it really had. Specifically, they had claimed to have 3 or 4 times more than they did. Today, that recent testimony I mentioned above suggests that they claim to have 100 timesmore than they actually do. And that, my friends, is a balloon waiting to be popped. The jig will be up soon.

A heist makes a great Hollywood movie, but I'm afraid this is just your generic Wall St fraud.

August 18, 2011

"The genius of you Americans is that you never make clear-cut stupid moves, only complicated stupid moves which make us wonder at the possibility that there may be something to them which we are missing."

July 07, 2011

Let's face it: any bargain seems to look good to you, as long as it kills people. That makes you tough, I guess. You have a list of Americans to assassinate. You have six wars going, and more in the pipeline. You've made clear that Israel murdering unarmed aid workers trying to reach Gaza would be A-OK with you. And "pain" is just the price that other people will have to pay to do without healthcare, food, a roof, a coat, or -- for that matter -- hope. Of all your slogans, we seem to be left with Audacity alone, standing by itself among the ruins.

March 10, 2011

[W]omen were not serving only as support workers, the habitual role to which they are relegated in protest movements, from those of the 1960s to the recent student riots in the United Kingdom. Egyptian women also organised, strategised, and reported the events. Bloggers such as Leil Zahra Mortada took grave risks to keep the world informed daily of the scene in Tahrir Square and elsewhere.

. . .

Two generations ago, only a small minority of the daughters of the elite received a university education. Today, women account for more than half of the students at Egyptian universities. They are being trained to use power in ways that their grandmothers could scarcely have imagined: publishing newspapers - as Sanaa el Seif did, in defiance of a government order to cease operating; campaigning for student leadership posts; fundraising for student organisations; and running meetings.

. . .

[T]he historical record of what happens when educated women participate in freedom movements suggests that those in the region who would like to maintain iron-fisted rule are finished.

One of the women featured in the photos, Gigi Ibrahim, was quoted as follows:

I started [my political activism] by just talking to people involved [in the labour movement]. Then I became more active and the whole thing became addictive. I went to meetings and took part in protests. I learned very quickly that most of the strikes in the labour movement were started by women [my emphasis].

. . .

I was in Tahrir Square on February 2, when pro-Mubarak thugs attacked us with petrol bombs and rocks. That was the most horrific night. I was trapped in the middle of the square. The outskirts of the square were like a war zone. The more things escalated the more determined we became not to stop. Many people were injured and many died and that pushed us to go on and not give up.

. . .

The women were also taking care of the wounded in makeshift clinics in the square. Some women were on the front line throwing rocks with the men. I was on the front line documenting the battle with my camera. It was like nothing that I have ever seen or experienced before.

Tonight protests began in Saubi Arabia, the country which, in all the world, is the most oppressive toward women. Friday, March 11, is being called a "Day of Rage" in Saudi Arabia, though it's not clear how large such protests might be, considering the medieval sort of control the government exerts over its people. Those planning the protests, according to Robert Fisk, intend to place women on the front lines, in the belief that Saudi police might be less willing to open fire with live ammunition. It's not clear to me whether Saudi women would have any choice about taking place in the front lines of such protests, as they have virtually no rights in that country and are treated as their husbands' or fathers' slaves. However, even if they go to the front lines unwillingly, it will surely change their perception of themselves. If they are shot at on the front lines, the revolution becomes their own; they become founding members whether they wanted the role or not. Revolutionary spirit spreads, and not only from one nation to another. I hope the Saudi women will be safe from bullets and nerve gas, and that they begin to recognize their own power.

February 21, 2011

It's been fascinating, watching this wave of revolutionary spirit catch fire across northern Africa and around the globe (now including places in China and perhaps the US). Max Keiser has dubbed it GIABO: Global Insurrection Against Banker Occupation. Futures speculators and central bank money printing are largely responsible (though weather plays a role too) in the skyrocketing price of food. Since people in northern Africa, the Middle East, and Asia pay a high percentage of their total income for food (frequently more than 40% and sometimes more than 60%), this inflation is devastating. Whatever the injustice and inequality has been in a given nation, it was the bankers' inflationary policies and speculative bets which pushed the people over the edge into desperation. It turns out starving people are not much afraid of tear gas or even live ammunition. If you watch this video of the Egyptian revolt, you'll hear a man saying "I haven't food, I haven't anything... I will die today!"

I'm reminded of something Robert Fisk (Middle East journalist) once said: When the people have lost their fear, you can't put fear back into them. Those in power can no longer cow them. In Libya the Air Force is bombing its own civilian population, and the Navy is firing into towns from offshore, but still they go on protesting.

In an act of intercontinental solidarity, an Egyptian has ordered a pizza for Wisconsin protesters, reports Politico. The call from Africa is just one of many streaming into the Madison, Wisc., pizza parlor Ian's from all over the world. So far, people from 12 countries and 38 states have rung up looking to help get free pizza to the Wisconsin protesters clustered in the Capitol.... [S]taff members fielded calls from as far away as Turkey, Korea, Finland, China, and Australia.

Many people in the US are very anti-union, but "the people" all over the world are going to have to go back to collective actions of various sorts, in order to reverse a level of economic inequality not seen since the 1920s.

Depressingly, I just read the book "Deer Hunting with Jesus," describing the white, rural, working poor. They feel no solidarity whatsoever with anyone poor in any other nation, and they do not take collective actions nor approve of unions. They seem to believe on some level that they are poor because they deserve to be poor, because in America, the land of opportunity, the best and brightest can rise to wealth and fame. This is the darker flip side to the American dream: the unarticulated shame felt by many of the poor. For the people in Joe Bageant's book, collectives such as unions would be seen as holding strong people back while rewarding the weaker members, in violation of the American ideal of individualism. I don't see these folks joining the Global Insurrection until their children are starving. That's why the American leg of the GIABO has begun with an existing union, which already had an organizational structure in place. But the revolt will spread, that's for sure. The government is still pretending we don't have inflation, even though an MIT study called the Billion Price Project says inflation is running at 10.6% annualized, so far this year. Nothing says "disgruntled populace" like a 10% paycut by stealth. But the government's bald-faced lies about inflation allow them not to increase Social Security, nor food stamps payments. The policy is: squeeze the poor and lavish brand-new money on the banks. Who thinks that sounds sustainable?

The only thing that's unrealistic in the second speech is that I rarely have so little as a $1.50 late fee at the public library. My impression is that we pay so many late fees we should have our names on a plaque somewhere, as devoted contributors to the library.